Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!isis!ico!rcd From: rcd@ico.isc.com (Dick Dunn) Newsgroups: comp.unix.i386 Subject: Re: RFS vs. NFS Summary: well, maybe, except for the // bit... Message-ID: <1990Aug21.183615.8315@ico.isc.com> Date: 21 Aug 90 18:36:15 GMT References: <797@hades.ausonics.oz.au> <1940@cybaswan.UUCP> <:4C5FLA@xds13.ferranti.com> Organization: Interactive Systems Corporation, Boulder, CO Lines: 27 peter@ficc.ferranti.com (Peter da Silva) mentions: > For a third choice, Intel's OpenNET software... > ...Instead a super-root, "//", is created. To access > files on a remote system, you access "//sysname/usr/bin..."... Ugh! This isn't the first time I've seen this trick, but it's still a bad idea. I wish all the clever developers who decided, "Yeah, we can just use a double / for that!" had been experienced with UNIX before they inflicted their bright ideas on us. Using // as magic *breaks* things. Historically, extra /'s are ignored in file names. People use this fact. The // at the beginning is particularly common; it derives from an idiom used to allow manipulating either some local subtree or root: ROOT= ... FILE=$ROOT/usr/bletch/gargle To play in a subtree, you set ROOT=/usr/myhome/playpen or some such. When you're ready to get serious, you set ROOT=/ which gives you FILE= //usr/bletch/gargle. (Don't bother telling me of the various ways to avoid the problem; I know. Nor preach to me about standards; I'm talking about existing practice:-) -- Dick Dunn rcd@ico.isc.com -or- ico!rcd Boulder, CO (303)449-2870 ...Are you making this up as you go along?